Compose styles
Rather than blending styles toward a middle, this gives them roles. The first one carries the structure, the next comes in as the accent, and anything after that shows up in a single detail. Where they fight each other, it says so before you start.
How to divide the work
- Composition
- Follow Dada: Keep one reading path; rotate and sever the rest
- Type
- Set in Dada's manner (Collide weights, directions and cases in one plane), and let Lettrism's lettering (Invented alphabets, asemic glyphs and salvaged type mixed without hierarchy) appear only where you want the eye to catch.
- Material
- Ground in Dada's material (Letterpress black, red, off-white; bind the accidents with repetition); bring in exactly one thing from Lettrism (Ink, paint and scratched film or paper—letters applied as physical marks).
- Colour
- Build on #efe6d0, #d7362f, #161513 and admit one accent from #c3c7c4, #ba8868, #37302f.
Where they fight
These are already listed as related entries, so the join should come easily.
Caution
- Dada Not decorative messiness. Decide which authority or custom you are objecting to.
- Lettrism Laying out unreadable letters as decoration alone drops the claim and leaves pattern. One legible word left in the field reinstates the meaning the work exists to suspend.
Image prompt
Produce four original images that take their structure from Dada (style, 1916–1920s) and their accent from Lettrism (style, 1946–1970s). ## What to make Make the kind of thing Dada exists for: cultural events and statements that doubt common sense, or making voice, noise and collision come before meaning. Choose one subject and hold it across all four. ## Structure comes from Dada - Rotated type - Fragments of sound - Collisions of scale - Unbalanced margins Composition: Keep one reading path; rotate and sever the rest. Type and lettering: Collide weights, directions and cases in one plane. ## Accent comes from Lettrism, used sparingly - Surfaces paved with unreadable characters - Handwriting mixed with type - Hypergraphy of proliferating signs - Letters handled as painterly material Let one material quality come from it: Ink, paint and scratched film or paper—letters applied as physical marks. ## Colour and feeling Build the ground on #efe6d0, carry the structure in #d7362f and #161513, and let a single accent come from #ba8868. These are read off real works, so a direction rather than a fixed palette. Feeling to carry: rebellion, play, exhilaration, technique. ## What goes wrong - Dada: Not decorative messiness. Decide which authority or custom you are objecting to. - Lettrism: Laying out unreadable letters as decoration alone drops the claim and leaves pattern. One legible word left in the field reinstates the meaning the work exists to suspend. ## Across the four Keep the roles fixed in all four. Vary the framing, the scale and the arrangement so the set shows what this pairing can do rather than four versions of one picture. ## Constraints - Do not imitate, reference or name any specific artist, studio, brand, character or copyrighted work. - Do not reproduce the composition of an existing work. - Produce original compositions in the general period languages described above.
Related entries
- Dada 1916–1920s / Style / Avant-garde
Deliberately dislocates meaning and order, making authority itself the material of the joke.
- Lettrism 1946–1970s / Style / Experimental Typography
A Paris-born movement that freed the letter from its duty of carrying meaning, treating sound and shape themselves as the material of the work. From surfaces paved with unreadable characters, to hypergraphy's proliferating signs, to marks scratched directly into film stock, it expanded the experiment of handling letters as physical matter.
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